30 June 2021 by particularkev

In neglecting the National Archives, the Morrison government turns its back on the future

Judith Brett, La Trobe UniversityWhy didn’t the federal government increase funding for the National Archives of Australia in its recent budget?

We know it wasn’t because of budget discipline. Money was splashed around on all sorts of worthy causes. And the emergency funding to save film and magnetic tape recordings from disintegration was modest: A$67 million over seven years.

Nor was it because a scorn for history is in the Liberal Party’s DNA. The party’s founder, Robert Menzies, was a history buff. His library, which is the centrepiece of the newly established Robert Menzies Institute at the University of Melbourne, is full of books of history and biography.

Moreover, his government established the precursor of today’s institution, the Commonwealth Archives Office, in 1961 so the records of the past could help guide the future. Prominent Liberals like Paul Hasluck and David Kemp have written histories, as has John Howard in The Menzies Era.

There are plenty of distinguished Liberal-aligned historians, and historians across the political spectrum supported the open letter to the prime minister, spearheaded by journalist Gideon Haigh and academic Graeme Davison.

Some commentators have seen the failure to provide the archives with emergency funds as a skirmish in the culture wars against an intellectual and cultural left purported to be obsessed with identity politics. This, the argument goes, is of a piece with the government’s apparent hostility to universities, its increase in fees for humanities degrees and its parsimonious treatment of the arts.

But was it that deliberate? Perhaps it was just careless philistinism in a budget designed for a forthcoming election. It was a budget addressed primarily to groups of voters rather than to national problems, and the users of archives will never swing a marginal electorate. Last week, The Australian ran an editorial on the issue, which concluded: “Failure to fund the NAA properly is an oversight that must be corrected.”

Embracing history is in the Liberal Party’s DNA – its founder, Robert Menzies, was a history buff.
Daniel Pockett/AAP

The government is wrong to think it is only professional and academic historians who use the archives. So do family historians, as the archives include personal records of hundreds of thousands of Australians. They are especially relevant to those of non-Anglo descent who had to apply to government authorities for various exemptions and entry permits. These include Indigenous Australians, Chinese living in Australia or displaced persons wanting to immigrate.

Haigh has pointed out that Treasurer Josh Frydenberg’s defence last year of his eligibility to sit in parliament depended on a document in the archives – the certificate of exemption from the provisions of the Immigration Act for his mother, then a seven-year-old girl deemed to be “stateless”.

The National Archives sit in the attorney-general’s department. Queensland Senator Amanda Stoker, who is assistant minister to the attorney-general as well as assistant minister for women and industrial relations, defended the government’s failure to provide the recommended emergency funding with the facile claim that “time marches on and all sources degrade over time”.

The government had nothing to be embarrassed about, she said, even when she was reminded Prince Charles had expressed his alarm at the threatened loss of records. Judging from her silly remarks, she seems to have given the subject little thought. The aim of the letter is to bring the archive’s budgetary neglect to the attention of the prime minister and his senior ministers.

While I do not think the neglect of the archives is a deliberate move in the culture wars, it is evidence of the Coalition’s truncated temporal imagination. This is in part an occupational hazard of politicians with their eyes on the electoral cycle. But it is also evident in the difficulty too many of the Coalition have in understanding what climate scientists have been telling them about the future, so they focus on present costs as if future costs will never arrive.

To understand the value of archives, we have to think not just about the past but about the future, when the present will be well and truly over. As the open letter says, the National Archives’ “most important users have not yet been born”, and we do not know what questions they will want to ask.

Thinking about time is difficult, wrenching oneself out of the dramas and routines of the present to fully imagine worlds that were and will be different, confronting our transience and our mortality.

Historians are experts in temporal imagining. They spend their days reading the words and examining the objects of the men and women who walked the world before us. We hope the prime minister will heed our words on the future’s desire for a memory bank of Australian life as full and rich as it can be.

Judith Brett, Emeritus Professor of Politics, La Trobe University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

11 December 2020 by particularkev

Visions of future cemeteries: 5 models and how Australians feel about them

Hannah Gould, University of Melbourne and Fraser Allison, University of Melbourne

The coming decades represent an era of uncertainty for Australia’s cemeteries. They also present an opportunity to reflect on what our public cemeteries could and should be.

Our cemeteries are running out of space, with more Australians dying than ever before. As a result of a growing and ageing population, the country’s annual death count has more than doubled since 1960. It will double again by around 2070.

Unlike other real estate, cemetery space is largely a non-renewable resource. Many European countries lease grave sites for a limited period, but most Australian states and territories stipulate that each burial must be preserved in perpetuity. New South Wales has introduced a system of opt-in 25-year leases.

Some intercity cemeteries have been closed to new burials for decades. Demands on cemeteries as green spaces for leisure and recreation, as well as commemorating the dead, are also growing.

This is what makes Victoria’s Harkness cemetery development, a 128-hectare site on the edge of Melbourne’s West Growth Corridor, so significant. It’s Victoria’s largest new cemetery development in 100 years.

An overview of the Harkness cemetery site 35km northwest of the Melbourne CBD.

Harkness will shape how Australians live and die for many generations to come. And it is an opportunity to imagine a new future for death in Australia.

We are investigating these issues as members of The Future Cemetery project team, in partnership with colleagues at the University of Melbourne, Oxford University and the Greater Metropolitan Cemeteries Trust. Shortly before the COVID-19 pandemic, we conducted two studies:

a co-design workshop with representatives of the Australian death care industry, which came up with five models for future cemeteries
a national survey of attitudes to cemeteries, which found many Australians are open to change.

How cemeteries are changing

Changes in demography, religious affiliation and technology, among other factors, shape public attitudes to how the dead should be treated.

The demographic trend is reasonably clear. Australia’s population is projected to grow strongly in coming decades (despite the effects of the coronavirus). This growth is driven mainly by high net overseas migration.

Australia’s religious diversity will likely increase, too. Christianity is projected to become a minority religion by 2050 for the first time since European colonisation, and the population of religiously unaffiliated is growing. The preference for burial or cremation within Australia’s diverse communities has a particular marked impact on future cemetery design.

Technology could also revolutionise cemetery design. New methods for treating human remains, such as recomposition (“human composting”), alkaline hydrolysis (“water cremation”) and natural burial, could alter the volume and kinds of remains that end up in cemeteries. Other technologies could change how we see the cemetery, from augmented-reality historical tours to remote grave visits through 3D drone photography.

Alkaline hydrolysis, or water cremation, is seen as a greener alternative to cremation.

Five visions of the future cemetery

The co-design workshop’s five models are:

the traditional cemetery as it currently exists
the nature park cemetery, which integrates burial grounds with native bushland to provide a space that is resource-neutral and open to the public for walking and picnics
the socially activated cemetery, which makes space available for a range of public uses, from educational activities such as birdwatching and botany to leisure activities such as playgrounds and cafés
the urban high-rise cemetery, which takes take the form of a centrally located urban building rather than a rolling open lawn, drawing inspiration from multi-storey columbaria in North-East Asia, to enable the deceased to be laid to rest close to their loved ones
the digital cemetery, which is the idea of a “technology layer” that will increasingly co-exist with, and perhaps one day even replace, the physical cemetery, where loved ones can share photographs, videos and stories about the deceased. In an age of pandemic lockdowns, this digital layer could even allow for people to visit graves remotely for memorial services.

Each of these models is a hypothetical – no cemetery in the near future is likely to follow a single model to the exclusion of all others. However, they point towards the differing options cemetery designers have to think about when planning for the next 100 years.

How do Australians see cemeteries?

Australians appear to be relatively open to considering new concepts for the cemetery.

In our national survey, two-thirds of respondents disagreed with the idea that “the cemetery should only be for the interment and memorialisation of the dead”. About a third of respondents supported the use of cemeteries as nature reserves to conserve plants and animals. Similar numbers agreed that a cemetery would be a good place to learn about historical and philosophical issues.

Leisure activities at the cemetery, such as exercise classes, picnics and concerts, attracted much less public support. And conspicuous technologies such as drones and virtual reality systems proved a bridge too far for most.

Most notable was a lack of strong feelings – positive or negative – about many of the proposals for the future cemetery. This suggests to us that, given taboos around death, Australians rarely have the chance to consider the cemetery and its potential uses. We are perhaps open to considering new technologies and ideas for the cemetery, as long as they are implemented respectfully and do not disrupt the fundamental need to mourn the dead.

Hannah Gould, ARC Research Fellow, Social And Political Sciences, University of Melbourne and Fraser Allison, ARC Research Fellow, Computing and Information Systems, University of Melbourne

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

22 November 2020 by particularkev

A birth certificate is a human right. Why aren’t they free and easier to get?

Liz Allen, Australian National University

This week marks the 31st anniversary of the Convention of the Rights of the Child.

As we reflect on the value and place of children, this gives us a chance to look at how birth registration and birth certificates operate in Australia today.

As the UN notes, “a name and nationality is every child’s right”. Australian academics have previously argued, the convention “implicitly includes the right to a birth certificate”.

Yet not every Australian child is registered or has a birth certificate.

When we think of children’s development and care, we don’t tend to think of the barriers to gaining such an important document. Or the appropriateness of an administrative process of birth notification and registration that hasn’t changed much in more than 160 years.

To reduce burdens on families and increase social engagement among the marginalised, we need seriously to consider alternatives to the traditional birth certificate.

With growing digital connectivity, are paper-based birth certificates still relevant?

Why do we need birth certificates?

All births in Australia are required to be registered by a parent or carer with the relevant state or territory registry office for births, deaths and marriages. This service is free.

Mother holding newborn baby. — All Australian babies need to be registered after they are born.
http://www.shutterstock.com

Birth registration is also a fundamental human right — it provides a record of the name, birth details, and very existence of someone. It also provides a government administrative function, helping to determine population estimates.

Birth certificates, on the other hand, aren’t automatically issued in Australia – there’s a fee involved with gaining this crucial piece of identification, potentially violating human rights.

These paper-based certificates are vital documents, needed for a huge range of crucial life events, from enrolling in school to opening a bank account, getting a passport, applying for government benefits, learning to drive, holding a tax file number to work in paid employment — even getting into a sporting team.

There’s a cost

The cost of a birth certificate varies across states and territories, but they are not insignificant. The Australian Capital Territory has the highest fee at $65.00, Victoria has the lowest at $33.80 (plus an additional $10 for postage).

All registry offices in Australia with the exception of Queensland can waive the fee. But information about fee exemptions is near impossible to find. Birth, Deaths and Marriages in Victoria is the only jurisdiction to make such information available on its website, but the process appears complicated and eligibility very narrow.

Not everyone has a birth certificate — and this is a problem

Despite the importance of birth certificates, not everyone has one.

Experiencing financial difficulties, moving house, being wary of government, and having lower English proficiency are among the reasons people may not have a birth certificate.

Births still go unregistered in Australia, mostly among people from disadvantaged and minority groups, including First Nations Australians and children of parents born overseas and from non-English speaking backgrounds.

Estimates suggest about 3% of births are not registered by a child’s fifth birthday, but this declines as young people approach the age of 15. Milestone events, like starting school and applying for a tax file number or driver’s licence, are triggers for either the realisation a birth isn’t registered or a prompt for registration.

There are no data on how many people in Australia do not hold birth certificates. The Victorian registry office reports the “majority” of people apply for a birth certificate when a baby is registered, but even they don’t know the actual numbers.

Young boy in school uniform. — Milestones, like starting school, can prompt a realisation a child does not have a birth certificate.
http://www.shutterstock.com

Investments have been made to increase the completeness of birth registration, particularly among First Nations Australians and in Victoria, but this has not extended to increasing the accessibility of birth certificates.

If births are registered for free, it follows that birth certificates should (and could be easily) be part of the free registration process.

Not having a birth certificate can render people invisible, particularly for the already vulnerable. Without a birth certificate, full recognition and participation in society including through education and employment is hindered.

There are other ways

The birth registration and certification process has not kept up with contemporary expectations.

Australian birth certificates themselves, for example, have altered very little since the 1930s — they remain paper-based and include similar information.

There are other systems available to make identification processes easier, but these also rely on individuals having paper copies of their birth certificates. The Australian government’s documentation verification service (DVS) is a central database enabling interrogation and confirmation of identity documentation.

Banks can use the DVS system, for example, to confirm the identity of an individual without seeing a birth certificate, relying on the birth certificate number.

There are, of course, safety issues when it comes to maintaining the security of identity data. But with so much other sensitive information now digitised, these risks can be managed. It’s also doubtful they outweigh the practical and equity concerns about continuing to rely on paper-based birth certificates.

What about Sweden?

Other countries are doing this better. Babies born in Sweden are immediately registered and added to a population address register by the hospital or midwife responsible for delivering the child. The child’s name is then updated by their parents or carers, and important information relating to each Swede is maintained throughout their life.

Crowds walking down street in Stockholm. — All Swedes are immediately registered by the hospital or midwife when they are born.
http://www.shutterstock.com

Australia has a similar hospital and midwife notification system in the National Perinatal Data Collection(NPDC). The NPDC isn’t used to help register births – it’s health-focussed — but it (or a registry-based) notification system has the potential to assist in redressing the invisibility too many Australians experience.

A better process for babies

The costs associated with buying a birth certificate for a baby appear more of a revenue raising endeavour than a public good.

Australia holds a number of different data system capabilities that could replace the outdated paper-based scheme of birth registration and certification.

Yes, there are security and logistical concerns, but we can manage them. It is most important to create a system where every baby is granted their fundamental human rights of recognition.

From a demographic perspective, we will have a more accurate and timely picture of all Australians — no matter the socioeconomic circumstances they might be born into.

Liz Allen, Demographer, ANU Centre for Social Research and Methods, Australian National University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

16 November 2019 by particularkev

If you’ve given your DNA to a DNA database, US police may now have access to it

DNA database giant Ancestry lets members access international records including the convict and free settler lists, passenger lists, Australian and New Zealand electoral rolls and military records.
Patrick Alexander/Flickr, CC BY

Jane Tiller, Monash University

In the past week, news has spread of a Florida judge’s decision to grant a warrant allowing police to search one of the world’s largest online DNA databases, for leads in a criminal case.

The warrant reportedly approved the search of open source genealogy database GEDMatch. An estimated 1.3 million users have uploaded their DNA data onto it, without knowing it would be accessible by law enforcement.

A decision of this kind raises concern and sets a new precedent for law enforcement’s access to online DNA databases. Should Australian users of online genealogy services be concerned?

Why is this a big deal?

GEDmatch lets users upload their raw genetic data, obtained from companies such as Ancestry or 23andMe, to be matched with relatives who have also uploaded their data.

Law enforcement’s capacity to use GEDmatch to solve crimes became prominent in April last year, when it was used to solve the Golden State Killer case. After this raised significant public concern around privacy issues, GEDmatch updated its terms and conditions in May.

Under the new terms, law enforcement agencies can only access user data in cases where users have consented to use by law enforcement, with only 185,000 people opting in so far.

The terms of the warrant granted in Florida, however, allowed access to the full database – including individuals who had not opted in. This directly overrides explicit user consent.

GEDmatch reportedly complied with the search warrant within 24 hours of it being granted.

Aussies are also at risk

GEDMatch is small fry compared with ancestry database giants Ancestry (more than 15 million individuals) and 23andMe (more than 10 million individuals), both of which have DNA data belonging to Australians.

Australians who wish to have ancestry DNA testing have to use US-based online companies. Thus, many Australians have data in databases such as Ancestry, 23andMe and GEDMatch. The granting of a warrant to search these databases by US courts means those searches could include Australian individuals’ data.

Ancestry and 23andMe both have policies saying they don’t provide access to their databases without valid court-mandated processes.

Each company produces a transparency report (see here and here) which includes all requests for customer data that have been received and complied with. Currently, that number is low. But it remains to be seen how each would respond to a court-ordered search warrant.

Furthermore, while Australia currently doesn’t have it’s own genetic database (and no plans have been announced), the federal government’s commitment of A$500 million to the Genomics Health Futures Mission indicates a growing interest in the power of genomics for health.

If Australia wants to remain internationally competitive, a national genetics project is a natural next step.

We need DNA privacy legislation

In Australia, courts can approve warrants that intrude into private information, and entities can only protect data to the extent that it’s protected by law.

Thus, the privacy policies of companies and organisations that hold genetic data (and other types of private data) usually include a statement saying the data will not be shared without consent “except as required by law”.

The Australian Information Commissioner can also allow breaches of privacy in the public interest.

It has been more than two decades since Senator Natasha Stott-Despoja proposed the Genetic Privacy and Non-Discrimination Bill.

Although Australia has a patchwork of laws that protect citizens’ genetic data to an extent, we still have no specific genetic data protection legislation. A broader legal framework dealing directly with the protection of genetic information is now required.

Australian politicians have previously shown willingness to use genetic information for government purposes. As genetic advances strengthen the promise of personalised medicine, Australian academics continue to call for urgent genetic data protection legislation. This is important to ensure public trust in genetic privacy is maintained.

Ongoing concerns around genetic discrimination, and other ethical concerns, warrant an urgent policy response regarding the protection of genetic data.

What are other countries doing?

Globally, several DNA databases have amassed genetic datasets of more than 1 million individuals, including for research purposes and healthcare improvement.

Few databases outside the US have yet to reach the numbers needed to be useful for identification purposes.

However, many countries, particularly in Europe, have started establishing government-funded national databases of gene donor data, including Sweden and Estonia.

The Estonian Biobank is one of the most advanced national DNA databases. It has more than 200,000 donor samples.

With a population of around 1.3 million people, the biobank represents around 15% of the entire country’s population. And Estonian legislation currently prohibits the use of donor samples for law enforcement.

In contrast, the UK Biobank, doesn’t have specific legislation controlling its operation. It only allows law enforcement agencies access if forced to do so by the courts, leaving open the possibility of access under a court-ordered warrant.

The biobank currently has samples from around 500,000 individuals, but plans to collect at least 1 million more in future.

In Australia, accessing DNA testing is now easier than ever. But those accessing it through US-based companies, or uploading their data to US-based databases, should be aware of the potential uses of their genetic information.

And as we moves into an era of genomic medicine, urgent policy attention is required from the Australian government to ensure public trust in genomics is maintained.

Jane Tiller, Ethical, Legal & Social Adviser – Public Health Genomics, Monash University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

26 October 2019 by particularkev

Migrant communities keep our cemeteries alive as more Anglo-Australians turn to cremation

Would you prefer to be buried or cremated?
Shutterstock

Wilfred Wang, Monash University; Gil-Soo Han, Monash University, and Helen Forbes-Mewett, Monash University

The Australian society has changed significantly since cemeteries in Victoria were planned and designed 150 years ago. But there haven’t been any major redevelopment or review of the community’s changing requirements for what happens to our bodies when we die.

The Australian population is ageing, with around 15% of Australians aged 65 and over in 2017. About a third of older people in Australia were born overseas, with most coming from a non-English speaking background.

This has implications for our rituals for death and memorialisation, as well as for existing and future cemeteries.

In a new collaborative research project taken from survey responses and in-depth interviews with members of different communities, we found cemeteries have ongoing significance to Australians, although its meaning and function are changing.

More than half of the 380 survey respondents said they still visit a cemetery once a year or more, and 23% visit once a month or more. But the interview data reveal a more complex and dynamic picture.

People from CALD communities believed Australia’s cemeteries are greener, better managed and less scary than those in their original countries.
Shutterstock

We found people from culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) communities tend to visit the cemetery more than their Anglo counterparts, and prefered to be memorialised in cemeteries to preserve a sense of belonging.

Anglo-Australians, on the other hand, generally prefer to be cremated and often choose to scatter ashes in places other than a cemetery. In one participant’s case, that meant scattering remains in a French vinyard, an island volcano and their local beach.

Calling Australia home

The cemetery remains an important site of cultural ritualisation and expression to most CALD interviewees.

Interviewees from the CALD communities – especially those from an Asian cultural background – had positive experiences with cemeteries in Australia. When comparing Australian cemeteries with those in Malaysia, Jenny (60s, Malaysian Chinese) said:

In Malaysia, the cemeteries are not like this […] they are all overgrown […] and we were taught that graves are places where the gangsters will hide out, the thieves will hide out, people will come and rob you, so we don’t go.

The perceptions that Australian cemeteries are more open, greener, better managed, more accessible, and not as scary as those in their original countries made many Asian migrants felt more willing to visit a cemetery here.

Besides the aesthetic contrast, for many CALD interviewees, the cemetery offers a space that embraces their culture and gives them a sense of belonging in Australia.

Tony (30s, Tongan) would love to have a traditional Tongan way of burial in Australia, which involves bone picking (removing the bones from the grave), and grave re-using for future generations. These traditions strengthen their inter-generational connections.

Australian regulations mean these ritual practices are not possible here. But Tony was prepared to make a compromise.

Instead of following the ritual, he insisted on being buried in Australia because his children and family live in Australia. The inter-generational connections can prevail here. They call Australia home.

Participants from the CALD communities generally shared Tony’s idea. They believed having a physical place in Australia (either a grave or a plot for the ashes) gave them a sense of belonging and settlement for themselves and their families.

A library of local history, not a ‘resting place’

On the other hand, people from an Anglo-cultural background no longer see cemeteries as just a space for memorialisation and mourning. From our interviews, many see it as a “library” or a “depository” of the local history and family genealogy.

Cemetery visits, in this sense, contrast between fulfilling one’s cultural duty of memorialisation, and obtaining historical knowledge for self-learning, reflection, and development.

Alfred’s (50s, Anglo-Australian) cemetery visits had been driven by his interest in his family history. Family history can give someone “an explanation” about the kind of person they are, and:

how the attitudes were passed on to the next generation so you can learn a tremendous amount, multi-generation through a family history search.

Yet, while many Anglo interview participants appreciated the historical and cultural values of the cemetery, they became less enthusiastic when considering the cemetery as their “resting places”.

We believe this corresponds with the nationwide trend since 2012 of more Australians preferring cremation to traditional full-body burial.

We found 56% of our survey respondents preferred cremation, 32% indicated preference for a ground burial and 12% were undecided.

In any case, our research indicated many people prefer to be memorialised at a place or site that’s meaningful. This might include their favourite beach or the park where they spent time with their children, rather than in a cemetery, which is outside their social, family spaces.

Tina (50s, Anglo-Australian) embarked on a global journey to fulfil her late husband’s wishes as he wanted his cremation remains (called cremains) scattered in three locations he loved: a vinyard in Burgundy, France, a volcano in Reunion Island, and the family’s local beach in Williamstown, Melbourne. Tina did all three.

Planning your body disposal

More people have started pre-planning what happens to their body when they die. The quantitative data shows 64% of people have already discussed their end of life-related wishes with close friends or family, and 11% have pre-paid for a funeral service.

In an earlier study, we found Chinese Australians, for example, tended to pre-purchase their funeral services and grave sites before they died.

As previously mentioned, this might enhance their sense of cultural belonging in Australia.

On the other hand, people from an Anglo cultural background would “talk about it”, but few actually “lock things in”.

Interviews from the present study revealed people with an Anglo cultural background had a strong desire of “flexibility”. Many didn’t wish to decide at the time of their interview, as they were still exploring possibilities and opportunities outside the conventional modes of body disposal and memorialisation.

In other words, the idea of being memorialised outside the cemetery was an emerging rather than established idea.

Understanding the contemporary and future funeral needs of the culturally diverse Australian population is important to policy makers, as well as the cemetery and funeral industries.

With increasingly limited access to usable land suitable for burial practices – particularly in metropolitan areas – planning must consider the funeral rites of the ageing population and incoming migrant groups. They are likely to make end of life choices in the coming decades.

Wilfred Wang, Lecturer, Communications & Media Studies, Monash University; Gil-Soo Han, Associate Professor, Communications & Media Studies, Monash University, and Helen Forbes-Mewett, Senior lecturer, Monash University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

23 October 2019 by particularkev

Australia: Cemeteries Running Out of Room

1 June 2018 by particularkev

A DNA test says you’ve got Indigenous Australian ancestry. Now what?

File 20180501 135837 1ocfg5o.jpg?ixlib=rb 1.1 — Families have secrets – and sometimes we don’t know our complete genetic histories.
from www.shutterstock.com

Elizabeth Watt, Deakin University; Emma Kowal, Deakin University, and Shaun Lehmann

Technologies for amplifying, sequencing and matching DNA have created new opportunities in genomic science. In this series When DNA Talks we look at the ethical and social implications.

Getting your “DNA done” is all the rage in the United States.

The sensationalism started with celebrities such as Jessica Alba, and Snoop Dog – and has now spread to hundreds of video bloggers disclosing their ancestry to drum rolls, exclamations, cheers and tears.

These tests claim to reveal deep ancestral origins, and many public users of this technology are black Americans seeking information about their African roots.

Snoop Dog sent his DNA to be tested – and did the maths faster than this TV host.

The uptake of direct-to-consumer genetic testing has been slower in Australia, and complicated by debates both beyond and within the Indigenous community – with some leaders calling on greater scrutiny to prevent “fakes” or “wannabes” calling themselves Indigenous.

One of the authors on this paper – Shaun Lehmann – was dropped into this debate inadvertently, after receiving the result of his own DNA test a few years ago.

Professional and personal

Shaun had more professional reasons for doing the test than most: at the time he was lecturing in human genetic diversity at the Australian National University, and wanted to use his own genetic data as teaching tool.

He also had personal questions about his maternal grandmother, who had died when he was a small child. She had grown up without her mother, and said little about her background.

Because they are related through a direct maternal line, Shaun knew that it was his grandmother, and by extension mysterious great-grandmother, who gave him his mitochondrial genome.

Mitochondria are the tiny organelles that make energy in our cells. While the genome in the nucleus of our cells – our 23 pairs of chromosomes – is made up of a mix of our biological mother’s and father’s DNA, the relatively small mitochondrial genome is passed down through the egg and so reflects a single line of maternal ancestors.

What Shaun didn’t know at the time, and what the test revealed, was that his particular mitochondrial genome fell into a haplogroup (a grouping of similar mitochondrial genomes) called “S2”, which has only been observed in Aboriginal Australians.

Interpreting genetic results

Being mitochondrial DNA, Shaun knew exactly where to look in his genealogy to find out more. Sure enough, he soon found records that his grandmother’s maternal family were Aboriginal people originally from the Albany area of Western Australia. With this information in hand, Shaun was able to trace his family tree to living Noongar relatives.

How mitochondrial DNA and nuclear DNA are passed on.
Wikimedia Commons, CC BY

Shaun’s discovery was certainly aided by the fact that he is a geneticist and could interpret his DNA test results. Most important, though, was that his Aboriginal ancestry happened to be in the direct maternal line.

Mitochondrial DNA is a reliable source of genetic information about Aboriginal ancestry, but it can’t help at all if your Aboriginal ancestors sit anywhere else in your family tree. That is, it’s only useful to track direct from mother to grandmother to great grandmother, and so on.

Different kinds of DNA tests

Most of the “ethnic breakdown” DNA results being shared publicly by bloggers come from testing companies that compare their nuclear DNA with material from various ethnic groups. The tests focus on variations in specific regions of genes – known as single nucleotide polymorphisms, or SNPs.

To our knowledge, DNA testing companies do not currently have reliable reference SNP data from Indigenous Australians.

One company offering tests claiming to identify Indigenous Australians uses an approach that compares sequences in genes known as Short Tandem Repeats, or STRs. STR data from around the world is widely available in the forensic science literature because it is widely used in criminal investigations and paternity testing.

Ethical and scientific concerns have been raised about the use of STR data for commercial ancestry testing. For example, it is difficult to know how companies get their reference samples.

The case of American blogger Lisa Garrigues is illustrative. Garrigues did a test back in 2010 – it reportedly gave her second “Highest Resolution Global Population Match” as “European-Aboriginal”.

She was excited by this discovery, but also sceptical – her family has no known connections to the Southern Hemisphere. Lisa and her father subsequently did more thorough DNA testing, and it didn’t suggest Aboriginal ancestry.

In our personal correspondence with one of the genetic genealogists that assisted Lisa, Doug McDonald suggests these kind of inconsistencies are extremely common – STR markers are not designed for ancestry tests, but for matching individual people.

After the test: now what?

We need to be on the lookout for misinformation and unethical practices around genealogy testing. But even where the science is reliable, such as Shaun’s mitochondrial DNA test, the implications of identifying genetic Indigenous ancestry are far from clear.

Shaun was proud to learn about his ancestry, and has since got in contact with his relatives. He is also looking into his grandmother’s past to find out whether her separation from her mother was influenced by the policies that led to the Stolen Generations.

Existing research suggests there are many possible endings for journeys like Shaun’s. Bindi Bennett’s work highlights how young, light-skinned people who had no previous ties to the Aboriginal community can develop a strong Indigenous identity, even in the face of resistance from that community.

But Fiona Noble’s 1996 research with Queenslanders who discovered their Aboriginal ancestry late in life suggests many of this demographic see their heritage as extremely important, but not all-defining.

They are more comfortable describing themselves as being “of Aboriginal descent” than “Aborginal”.

As Regina Ganter notes, the “in-between” status of these “half-steps” is not well-recognised contemporary policy and discourse – which tends to frame Aboriginality as an either/or identity.

Although Noble and Bennett’s research participants discovered their heritage through documents or family stories, not genetics, their work offers a window onto a future where more Australians discover Aboriginal ancestry through DNA tests.

Without a doubt, the inevitable collision of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australia with direct-to-consumer genetic testing will continue to raise challenging questions about ancestry and identity in the 21st century.

Elizabeth Watt, Research Fellow, Deakin University; Emma Kowal, Professor of Anthropology, Deakin University, and Shaun Lehmann, PhD Student, Australian National University

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

8 January 2018 by particularkev

Mum, dad and two kids no longer the norm in the changing Australian family

File 20171220 4965 1shr6f1.jpg?ixlib=rb 1.1 — Grandparent-led families are increasingly significant in Australia.
Shutterstock

Brendan Churchill, University of Melbourne

The image of the typical family – mum, dad, and two kids – still permeates how we define and understand the family in contemporary Australia. This ideal saturates our screens and newsfeeds and was at the centre of the marriage equality debate, underscoring the pervasiveness of the nuclear family as the dominant family form in our consciousness.

However, this conceptualisation masks the true nature of Australian families, which has changed significantly in recent decades. As sociologists and demographers have long known, the Australian family is as diverse and different as the country’s terrain.

Drawing on data from the 2016 Census, we know there are more than 6 million families in Australia. This is a significant increase from the 5 million or so families counted at the 2011 Census.

Figure 1 – Family composition.
2016 Census – Counting Families, Place of Enumeration

Of these 6 million families, the most-common family form (as illustrated in Figure 1) was the couple family with no children (37.76%). The next-most-common was couple families with dependent children under the age of 15 (30.64%).

These proportions confirm that the nuclear family is no longer the most common family form in Australia. One-parent families with dependent children comprise around 8% of all Australian families.

Reflecting this move away from the traditional, nuclear family and the rise of more couple families without children, is the size of families. In 2016, around 30% of all families were two-person families. A further 27% were four-person families.

Figure 2 – Family blending.
2016 Census – Counting Families, Place of Enumeration

Most couple families with children in Australia are so-called “intact families” (89.94%), consisting of at least one one child who is the natural or adopted child of both partners in the couple.

However, families are becoming increasingly more “blended”, as couples dissolve (due to separation, divorce or death of a partner) and new families are formed.

Blended families are a small proportion of modern Australian family forms, accounting for just over 3.7% of all families. This includes families with two or more children, at least one of whom is the natural or adopted child of both partners and at least one other child who is the step-child of one of them.

A further 6.3% of families are step-families. Here, there is at least one resident step-child, but no child who is the natural or adopted child of both partners.

Grandparent-led families are also increasingly significant.

Grandparents already play a significant role in Australian family lives through the provision of informal child care, but there are now just over 60,000 grandparent families in Australia (which a significant increase from estimates in 2004, which found around 22,500 grandparent families). Of those, 53% of grandparent families are couple families with grandchildren and 47% are lone grandparent families.

Figure 3 – Family composition by same-sex.
2016 Census – Counting Families, Place of Enumeration

The 2016 Census gathered information on same-sex couples. Compared with opposite-sex couples, these data show that family forms differ across sexual orientation.

Overall, around 15% of same-sex couples had children. Female same-sex couples were more likely to be in couple families with dependent children (20.67%) compared to male same-sex couples (3.10%), or opposite-sex couples (37.8%).

However, same-sex couples were still more likely to be in couple families with no children than were opposite-sex couples, and they were more likely to have smaller families. Of those, around 54% of male same-sex couples with children and 51% of female same-sex couples with children had one-child families. One-third of same-sex couples had two children.

In comparison, 36% of opposite sex-couples had one child, and 42% had two children.

What these data from the 2016 Census show is just some of the diversity within the Australian family. While the idealised nuclear family of the past is no more, this does not mean that the family as a social institution is in decline, or that families in contemporary Australia are at risk.

But it does mean families are changing. Our political leaders should reflect on this diversity to ensure social policies reflect these differences, so that all families are well supported.

Brendan Churchill, Research Fellow, University of Melbourne

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

25 October 2017 by particularkev

Census data shows just how bad we’ve been at closing inequality gaps

Nicholas Biddle, Australian National University and Francis Markham, Australian National University

The latest round of 2016 census data shows that the gig economy has taken hold in Australia, that there has been a huge surge in fitness, beauty and barista jobs; and that even though we’re working less, women still do the most housework.

But if we look past these headlines, the Census gives us a unique insight into the economic outcomes of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander population, single parents, those entering the labour market and those coming to the end of their working life.

What we see is geographic divergence in Indigenous employment, declines in employment for single parents and the young, and the news is mixed for those entering retirement age.

Indigenous employment outcomes

One of the targets of the Closing the Gap strategy (which is slated to undergo a “sweeping overhaul”) is to “halve the gap in employment outcomes between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians within a decade (by 2018).”

But the latest census data shows that there has been no demonstrable improvement in employment outcomes over that decade, or even in the five years between the 2011 and 2016 Censuses.

https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/K2V9h/4/

Specifically, 44.1% of the adult Indigenous population was employed in 2016, compared to 44.2% in 2011. Over this period, employment rates for Indigenous women increased by 1.3%, but fell for Indigenous men by a similar amount.

For the total Australian population, there has been a decline in the employment-to-population ratio over the same period (61.4% to 60.2%). On this measure, there has been a small convergence between the Indigenous community and the total Australian populations. However, this will not lead to a closing or even a halving of the gap any time soon.

https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/tPrXD/2/

This national-level stagnation also hides considerable geographic variability, as shown in the map below.

In remote Australia, employment has fallen dramatically in most regions, with employment-to-population ratios plummeting by more than 15% in some regions. Much of this decline is likely attributable to the phasing out of the Community Development Employment Projects scheme and its replacement with a work-for-the-dole program whose participants are classified as unemployed.

Clearly, current employment policies are failing to create sufficient jobs for Indigenous people in remote Australia.

In more populous areas, Indigenous employment has grown steadily, especially in NSW where employment growth has been particularly rapid and has been accompanied by substantial population increase.

Change in Indigenous employment-to-population ratios across Australia, 2011 – 2016, by Indigenous Region.

There are many good arguments for rethinking the Closing the Gap targets. However, they have had the benefit of highlighting policy failure and success. Hopefully a renewed focus on strengths and positive achievements does not diminish this accountability.

Single parent families

According to the Census, there was 959,543 single parent families on the night of the Census. Of these, around 54.2% were employed, 5.9% were unemployed and the remainder not in the labour force. By comparison, in 90.6% of couple families with children, at least one parent was employed in 2016.

https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/UloEE/2/

https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/ZCdL3/1/

Through time, there are slightly fewer single parent families where the parent is employed as a percentage of all single parent families (54.7% in 2011 compared to 54.2% in 2016).

That is, despite considerable focus on childcare, significant changes to welfare policy, and a number of active labour market policies and changes to employment support, a child in a single parent household is less likely to have that parent employed than five years ago.

From a policy perspective, we should be careful about forcing single parents to work when they have caring responsibilities that cannot be substituted. However, we have to do better in providing the support, training and employment environment where those single parents who do want to work are able to.

This includes ensuring childcare is sufficiently flexible, affordable and of high quality, trialling targeted interventions that boost skills and employability, and lessening the conditionality of parenting payments that reduce the incentives for recipients to find work.

New labour market entrants and those of retirement age

The current labour market is clearly working for some, but not others. Two groups for whom employment is particularly important are the relatively young and those at the end of their working lives.

For the young, early exposure to long periods of unemployment or underemployment can be very costly throughout their lives. Early periods of unemployment predict employment outcomes across their life.

For those nearing retirement age, maintaining an active and conscious engagement with the labour force (on their own terms) can support health outcomes and financial stability.

Focusing on the young, to start with, we can look at the 25-29 year old population. For the majority of this group, school and post-school education is mostly finished, and child care and other responsibilities are yet to have kicked in. Over the last five years, however, employment for this group has gone backwards.

https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/xyyBr/3/

Among the 25-29 year old group, the unemployment rate has increased from 5.9% to 7.1%, whereas the employment-to-population ratio has decreased from 78.4% to 77.1%.

The young adult labour market is not what it was pre-global financial crisis (the unemployment rate for 25-29 year olds in the 2006 Census was 5.6%), or at the peak of the mining boom. Clearly the macro-economy matters, but we also need to trial and adjust new types of active labour market support for young adults.

https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/IYKvz/3/

As a society, we are going to be increasingly reliant on those at the end of their working lives to support and mentor people entering the labour market, to maintain the tax base, and to support themselves as they prepare for retirement.

Here, the news is a bit more positive, though not completely so. It is true that the employment-to-population ratio has increased for 60-64 year olds (from 50.3% in 2011 to 53.8% in 2016). However, the unemployment rate for this group has also gone up (from 4.1% to 5.8%).

More people are working, but more people are actively looking for work. On balance, this is probably positive, but we also need to make sure that we are minimising the incidence and effects of age-related discrimination.

Delving into the employment statistics in the 2016 Census tells a more nuanced story than is evident from the monthly Labour Force Survey. In particular, remote Indigenous employment and outcomes for single parents show deeply concerning trends. Policy measures may need urgent consideration to increase employment opportunities and ameliorate poverty among these population groups.

**Correction and Editor’s note: This article was updated on 25 October to correct the first chart on Indigenous employment outcomes. The chart had previously misstated the figures on those employed, unemployed and the total labour force. The Conversation apologises for these editing errors and thanks reader John Blake for alerting us to them.

Nicholas Biddle, Associate Professor, ANU College of Arts and Social Sciences, Australian National University and Francis Markham, Research Fellow, College of Arts and Social Sciences, Australian National University

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

13 July 2017 by particularkev

Five lessons from Tokyo, a city of 38m people, for Australia, a nation of 24m

File 20170706 18401 1osijpf — Tokyo, seen here from the Skytree tower, is home to more people than any other city on Earth but has managed to remain highly liveable.
Brendan Barrett, Author provided

Brendan F.D. Barrett, RMIT University and Marco Amati, RMIT University

Population growth has profound impacts on Australian life, and sorting myths from facts can be difficult. This article is part of our series, Is Australia Full?, which aims to help inform a wide-ranging and often emotive debate.

The release of 2016 Census data provides a good opportunity to reflect on the future growth of Australian cities. And what better example of the future to use than Tokyo?

Frequently the subject of futuristic visions, the city went through one of the world’s most rapid post-war population growth periods. The Greater Tokyo area has a population of 38 million – almost 60% more than the population of Australia. Yet Tokyo remains one of the world’s most liveable metropolises.

How can Australian cities replicate this conjuring feat while retaining their own high levels of liveability? We identify five lessons from Tokyo’s experience.

Lesson 1: manage urban growing pains

Tokyo was devastated at the end of the second world war. The city experienced rapid rebuilding and growth. The population of the central Tokyo prefecture, which is home to 13.5 million people, increased from 3.5 million in 1945 to 11.6 million in 1975.

This 30-year growth spurt happened at a rate almost twice that predicted for Greater Melbourne, for example, from 4.4 million today to 8 million by 2050.

Tokyo’s rapid growth had a number of negative impacts. These included very significant environmental pollution. The basic approach during this period was to grow first and clean up later.

The consequence for Tokyo was disorganised patterns of urban development – sprawl. The answer involved tighter planning controls and land re-adjustment programs to improve environmental conditions and ensure infrastructure was effective.

The lesson here for Australian cities is that, in the face of rapid population growth, better forward planning is the only way to avoid or minimise negative side effects.

Lesson 2: Introduce metropolitan governance

A critical factor in Tokyo’s liveability is the role of metropolitan governance in ensuring good planning and co-ordination.

The Tokyo Metropolitan Government was established in 1943. In contrast, for Australian cities a metropolitan level of co-ordination is the exception rather than the rule. With Greater Melbourne, for example, the Victorian Planning Authority plays an important role but lacks oversight from local political representatives. The governor and the assembly members in the Tokyo Metropolitan Government, on the other hand, are accountable to the electorate.

Tokyo’s governor, pictured campaigning for the July 2 assembly elections, is one of the most powerful politicians in Japan.
Brendan Barrett, Author provided

The Tokyo government also has considerable political autonomy since it generates 70% of its revenue from local taxation. In 2014, it had a budget of ¥13 trillion (A$151 billion) – on a par with Sweden’s. This makes the governor of Tokyo one of the most powerful politicians in Japan, second only to the prime minister.

The Tokyo government’s approach has always involved strong interventionist policy and considerable emphasis on infrastructure development, with a reliance on public-private partnerships to get results.

Lesson 3: Commit early to world-class public transport

Public-private partnerships to develop metropolitan railways has been a standard approach in Japanese cities for most of the 20th century and continues to underpin Tokyo’s success as a global city. For example, the Mitsubishi Corporation played an instrumental role in developing the Marunouchi district around Tokyo Station. The latter was built in 1914 and connected intercity stations in a loop decades before other cities.

These public-private interventions have cemented Tokyo’s status as a transit-oriented metropolis. The city has by far the highest public transport usage in the world.

Compared to other major cities like Seoul, London, New York and Beijing, Tokyoites rely far more heavily on public transport, cycling or walking to get around. In Tokyo prefecture, rail accounts for 48% of trips, bus 3%, cycling 14% and walking 23%. Private car use accounts for only 12% of trips.

A continuous investment in rail networks above and below ground would ensure Australian cities can better accommodate predicted population growth. A fascinating map designed by Adam Mattinson shows what a subway system for Melbourne could look like based on the Tokyo model. To achieve this may require that the tram system moves underground – almost certainly a pipe dream.

In Tokyo prefecture, 48% of trips are by rail as everyone lives within ten minutes’ walk of the subway station.
Brendan Barrett, Author provided

Lesson 4: Decarbonise the economy as it grows

Tokyo was lucky to be able to grow rapidly in an era when climate change was not the recognised problem that it is today.

The challenge for Australian cities will be to grow their economies while reducing their greenhouse gas emissions to match the per capita levels for Tokyo, and then to cut them much further. The World Bank calculated that in 2006, per-capita emissions for Sydney were 20.3 tonnes of CO₂, compared to 4.89 tonnes for Tokyo.

Tokyo is also seeking to cut its emissions by 30% by 2030 compared to 2000. In Australia, Plan Melbourne, for example, aims to achieve a target of net zero emissions by 2050 even while the population continues to grow.

While investments in low-carbon public transport will be central to meeting this target, it is also essential to pursue ambitious energy efficiency and renewable energy targets.

Tokyo is aiming for a 38% drop in energy consumption and a rise in renewable energy from 8.7% in 2014 to 30% of electricity generation in 2030. The good news is that Plan Melbourne sets a target for renewables of 40% of electricity generation by 2025.

In a decarbonising city, mothers ride electric cycles with babies and shopping on board.
Brendan Barrett, Author provided

Lesson 5: Prepare to age with dignity

Along with declining emissions intensity, Tokyo’s population is likely to start shrinking. The population of central Tokyo is expected to rise from 13.5 million today and peak in 2020 before declining to 7.1 million by 2100. The population of Greater Tokyo is expected to peak around 38.5 million about the same time.

The population of Australian cities will plateau at some point, as in Tokyo. The next lesson would be how to deal with an ageing demographic and potential population decline.

As recently argued based on the census, a result of declining home ownership is the likelihood of couples deferring the decision to have children. A knock-on effect could therefore be a more rapidly ageing Australian population.

The Tokyo of today is certainly no utopia, due to its vulnerability to earthquakes and other natural disasters, high house prices, homelessness, rising inequality, a lack of multiculturalism and a proportion of housing as rental accommodation that dwarfs Australia’s (47.9% compared to 30.9%).

Yet the largest settlement on the planet offers useful lessons – historical, present and future – that can guide the urban policies of other countries.

You can read other articles in the Is Australia Full? series here.

Brendan F.D. Barrett, Senior Lecturer, Program Manager, Masters on International Urban and Environmental Management, RMIT University and Marco Amati, Associate Professor of International Planning, Centre for Urban Research, RMIT University

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

	Margaret Weston on BULAHDELAH PIONEER AND CA…
	Melanie on BULAHDELAH PIONEER AND CA…
	particularkev on BULAHDELAH PIONEER AND CA…
	Melissa Brooks on BULAHDELAH PIONEER AND CA…
	Janette on BULAHDELAH PIONEER AND CA…

Share this:

How cemeteries are changing

Five visions of the future cemetery

How do Australians see cemeteries?

Share this:

Why do we need birth certificates?

There’s a cost

Not everyone has a birth certificate — and this is a problem

There are other ways

What about Sweden?

A better process for babies

Share this:

Why is this a big deal?

Aussies are also at risk

We need DNA privacy legislation

What are other countries doing?

Share this:

Calling Australia home

A library of local history, not a ‘resting place’

Planning your body disposal

Share this:

Share this:

Professional and personal

Interpreting genetic results

Different kinds of DNA tests

After the test: now what?

Share this:

Share this:

Indigenous employment outcomes

Single parent families

New labour market entrants and those of retirement age

Share this:

Lesson 1: manage urban growing pains

Lesson 2: Introduce metropolitan governance

Lesson 3: Commit early to world-class public transport

Lesson 4: Decarbonise the economy as it grows

Lesson 5: Prepare to age with dignity

Share this: